Pro-choice supporters will protest outside the Roma St police station at noon this Friday (October 2).
The protest is part of the ongoing campaign against the prosecution of a Cairns couple under the state’s anti-abortion laws.
Pro-Choice Action Collective activist, Kathy Newnam stated “the police have targeted a young couple in Cairns to create a test case designed to set back access to abortion in Queensland.
“Despite the anti-abortion laws, abortion has effectively been available on demand through private clinics. Most people are not even aware that abortion is still subject to criminal law.
“Some say that this accessibility has been based on the “good will” of police “turning a blind eye”. The more realistic explanation is that the laws have not been enforced because police are only too aware of the widespread support for abortion access and the sort of opposition that would be faced if there were any attempts to enforce the law.
“While it may have faded from popular memory, there are still many who remember the widespread social and political response to the abortion clinic raids of the 1980s. Indeed it was the opposition that was mobilised in that era that led to the liberalised access that exists today.
“In prosecuting the Cairns case, the Queensland Police have made a calculated political judgment. They think they can create a new precedent through this case. They have targeted an isolated working class couple in regional Cairns in a case that does not involve a local doctor.
“In the Cairns Committal hearing the police prosecution argued that it didn’t even matter that there was no proof that the woman was pregnant – because they argued that under the law a woman is “guilty of a crime” if she does anything “with intent to procure her own miscarriage” even if she is not actually pregnant at the time.
“This is the interpretation of the law that the police prosecution is seeking. This is the precedent that they are seeking.
“There are thousands of terminations in Queensland every year. The Queensland Police initiated and pursued this particular case because they think they can get away with targeting this young couple.
“The growing campaign against these charges is determined to prove the police wrong. They won’t get away with this attack on abortion rights. We will fight to have the charges against the Cairns couple dropped and we will build a campaign that will force the government to repeal the anti-abortion laws. No-one should ever again have to face the trauma that the young couple in Cairns are going through”.
For more information, contact the Pro-Choice Action Collective on 0400 720 757 (Kathy).
